Mr. Chambers' marriage, in 1884, united him with Jane Elizabeth Perry, a native of Fresno County, born in Centerville, a daughter of Peter and Amanda (Lowrey) Perry, the father being a native of North Carolina, and related to Commodore Perry, and the mother a native of Tennessee. Peter Perry was married in 1857 and crossed the plains to California with the party which was massacred at Mountain Meadow. The party was divided into two trains, each taking a different route, and he was the captain of the train which escaped the Indians. He settled on Kings River, near Centerville, Fresno County, and engaged in stock-raising. His death occurred in 1876, while his wife died at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Chambers in Fresno, on March 23, 1919.
Of the union of Mr. and Mrs. Chambers seven children are now living, as follows: Wayne, ranching on Pine Ridge; Eleanor, the wife of H. A. Savage, an attorney of Fresno; Nellie, the wife of E. F. Brieger, of Tehachapi; Annie Laurie is Mrs. Howard Perry, of Fresno; Belle Elizabeth, of Fresno; Ella, a graduate of Fresno High School, now attending Fresno State Normal School; and John. Jr., attending Fresno High School.
Fraternally, Mr. Chambers is a Woodman of the World, and an Odd Fellow. Mrs. Chambers recalls her childhood days in Fresno County, when, instead of the teeming city of Fresno, there was one vast plain over which roamed antelope and wild cattle.
CHARLES HENRY RICHARDSON.
A successful California dairyman who once dwelt at the other end of the great American continent, where he was equally prosperous in raising potatoes in the fruitful fields of Aroostook County, Maine, is Charles Henry Richardson, one of Fresno's prosperous ranchmen. He was born at Solon, Somerset County, on May 14, 1864, and his father was Levi C. Richardson, also a native of Solon, who came from a Yankee family extending generations back. The Richardsons came from England and settled at Woburn, Mass., taking a prominent part in the Revolutionary War. Levi Richardson was a school teacher, but about 1878 moved to Fort Fairfield. Aroostook County, Maine, there to engage in the raising of potatoes; while there he continued to teach school. He died in that place in his sixty-fifth year.
Mrs. Levi G. Richardson was Elmira Jackson before her marriage, and she also was born at Solon, a member of one of the old Maine families. After a while she came to California; but she spent less than a year here, and then she returned to Maine, where she now resides at the old homestead. She was the mother of three children, two girls and a boy; of whom Charles is the oldest and the only one in California.
He was reared at Solon on the Kennebec River, and from a lad took charge of the farm, at the same time that he attended the public school. He thus not only acquired the A B C's of agricultural experience, but what was to be of inestimable value in later years, he learned to rely upon himself. In 1878 he removed to Fort Fairfield where his parents bought 120 acres of land, eleven acres of which was cleared, and the balance timbered. Each year they cleared and burned up such a part that they soon had about eighty acres under cultivation. He had charge of the home place, and in common with many in that section, father and son raised potatoes as a specialty.
Through reading. Charles became interested in California: and being attracted to the state because of the reported mildness of its climate, he came to California in 1905 and was so satisfied with what he saw that he sold his eastern home and settled here. He did not choose Fresno County however until he had first traveled the state and had become convinced that Central California offered more to the square mile than any other part. He then bought land in the Houghton district, now Roosevelt, his first place being two miles west of his present homestead. It was an alfalfa ranch, and he ran it for a year, but thinking he could do still better, he bought, in 1906, his present place, which consists of eighty acres on McKinley Avenue, situated ten miles northwest of Fresno. Having disposed of the other property, he has devoted this to dairying and the raising of alfalfa. The soil is excellent, and is well irrigated, being under the Herndon canal, the ranch also being equipped with a first-class pumping plant run by electric power and having a five-inch pump. He is also interested in sixty acres adjoining, which his son runs as a dairy.
While at Fort Fairfield, Mr. Richardson married Elizabeth Bloomfield, a native of the province of New Brunswick, by whom he has had five children: Marion L., who was in the Second California Infantry and served during the border trouble with Mexico. He was honorably discharged but when the great war was declared with Germany he enlisted and was in the Fortieth Division overseas. Since his discharge he has been ranching near the home place; Charles E., who also did his duty and was First Lieutenant in the Marine Corps attached to the second separate machine gun battalion, is also ranching in Fresno County; Otto B., who was a corporal in the 187th Company, United States Marine Corps, and is now in the general merchandise business at Rolinda, under the firm name of Houghton and Richardson; and Edith and Ruth. The family attend the United Presbyterian Church at Barstow, in which Mr. Richardson is a ruling elder; and they also do their civic duty under the banners of the Republican party, to which Mr. Richardson has belonged for years.
WILLIAM SHERMAN RICHMOND.
An enterprising orchardist and vineyardist who represents in his own family history one of the sturdy Americans who fought for the preservation of the Union, and whose wife is the direct descendant of an Ohio pioneer who once owned part of the site of Columbus, is William Sherman Richmond. He first came to California in the late eighties; and ever since he has been deeply interested and active in contributing toward the development of that part of the great state in which he cast his fortunes.
He was born in Memphis, Scotland County, Mo., on January 26, 1867, the son of Theodore W. Richmond, a native of Indiana, who came to Iowa, where he homesteaded. When the Civil War broke out, he raised a company and was elected captain of Company H of the Nineteenth Iowa Volunteer Infantry. He was present at the siege of Vicksburg, but was incapacitated by malaria for much service. After the war, he farmed in Scotland County, and there he died in his sixty-seventh year. His family was one of the old New York group and had its place in the history of the Empire State.
Mrs. Richmond was Elvira Irish before her marriage, and she was born in Indiana. Her parents came from' Connecticut, and they originated with the old Mayflower stock. After a useful life she passed away in Missouri, the mother of ten children, six of whom are still living. Albert C. is in Texas County, Mo.; Kate has become Mrs. Bull of Kalispell, Mont.; Frank M. lives at Ogallala, Nebr.; Carrie resides in Fresno; and besides the subject of our sketch, there is Emmett G. Richmond, also of Fresno County.
Brought up on a farm in Missouri, William S. attended the public schools, including the grammar grade and the high school of Memphis, and when twenty-two came to California in 1889, settling in the vicinity of Reedley and Dinuba. Fresno was then a very small town. He went to work on the grain farm for Crow & Agee, and with them he continued for a couple of years. After that he returned to Missouri and followed farming with his father.
In 1902 he came once more to the West and going to Lawton, Okla., settled in the Comanche and Apache country, and bought a relinquishment claim and homesteaded 160 acres. He improved it and obtained a patent signed by President Roosevelt. In 1909 he sold the property at a good advance, and with the proceeds came on to California. He was not long in discovering the superiority of Fresno County, and bought a ranch of twenty acres on Chittenden and Clinton Avenue in Roeding's Villa Colony; and there he engaged in horticulture. He set out peaches, apricots and a vineyard; then bought ten acres, added to that, and now he has twenty-five acres, all improved with a fine residence, comfortable barns and a desirable pumping plant. Besides